ALMGHTY GOD?

One of our skylights has been leaking for years. Since the rains have been infrequent here in Southern California, we have been avoiding the expense of replacing it by patching and grouting on the roof (it hasn't worked) and putting out towels and buckets to catch the water when it rains. This year, we finally decided to bite the (expensive!) bullet and have the thing replaced. Once that was done, we were so pleased with the result that we've been considering replacing the second skylight, and our guy came to visit yesterday to give us a new estimate.

He's an ex-Marine. Served on active duty in Vietnam. Has seen war at first hand, on the battlefield. So we got to talking about war. Like many of the military people I have met, Patrick strikes me as man who has learned an inner sense of discipline and respect for those around him, along with a quiet focus on the mission at hand. I suspect that military training can teach these qualities, which are rare in today's slapdash, me-first, anything-goes world. I imagine--and this is something I do not know first hand--that a person comes to value life much more when threatened with its loss, or when seeing others lose it. Patrick reminded me of a study I once read, that many soldiers in battle cannot bring themselves to shoot to kill, but instead aim purposely away from the targets they are ordered to shoot. He himself feels blessed that he was never required to aim specifically at another human being, but only at shadows moving in the jungle. He thinks, and hopes, he never killed anyone.

We agreed, then, on the horrors of war--I as one who was never of an age to be called upon for combat, he who was a combatant. We agreed on our disgust at having been led into wars that were dubious at best, and on the current fear of being led into another conflict in the Mideast by a president who knows nothing of war and whose dishonesty is known not only in this country but throughout the world. Patrick said there's only one more devastating power than war, and that's God Almighty! Not a believer in that God myself, I recognize that power in the universe, whose explosive, infinite expanse and grandeur make our little human wars look puny.